| The Every Day of Life |
Chapter 19 |
Page 5 |
It may be struggle. Life is not easy for any of us. Every day is a prolonged conflict. We desire to live right; but there is an old law in our members, a law of sin, which contests every holy advance. We want to live lovingly, but the natural heart’s bitterness keeps breaking out in us continually, in bad tempers, in ugly dispositions, in envies, jealousies, selfishness’, and all hateful things. We wish to live purely; but the dark streams of lust ever well up out of the deep, black fountains of our being; staining the white flowers that Christ has planted in our life’s garden. Thus the days are full of struggle and conflict, and sometimes we feel that there is no use trying to be good. Yet this burden is “that he hath given thee,” and therefore we may cast it upon God.
Or sorrow may be the burden. God has no children without sorrow, and in many cases the load seems too heavy to be borne; but again it is “that he hath given thee,” and we may lay the burden on him who is mighty.
Or your lot in life may be your burden. It is uncongenial. The circumstances are unkindly. It seems to you impossible to live lovingly, to grow up into beauty, and to ripen into Christ-likeness in your environment. But against it is “that he hath given thee.” God planted you just where you are, and when he did it he knew it was the place in which you could grow best into noble character. He gives you this burden of environment, and you may cast it again upon him. Says Mr. Longfellow: “The every-day cares and duties, which we call drudgery, are the weights and counterpoises of the clock of time, given its pendulum a true vibration and its hands a regular motion; and when they cease to hang from the wheels, the pendulum no longer swings, the hands no longer move, the clock stands still.”
Our burden, whatever it is, God’s “gift,” and has a define blessing in it for us, if we take it up in faith, in love. “That he hath given” we may always bring to him again, seeking his help in hearing it from him.
“Thy burden is God’s gift,
And it will make the bearer calm and strong;
Yet, lest it press too heavily and long,
He says, ‘Cast it on me,
And it shall easy be.’
And those who heed his voice,
And seek to give it back in trustful prayer,
Have quiet hearts that never can despair,
And hope lights up the way
Upon the darkest day.
It is the lonely load
That crushes out the light and life of heaven;
But borne with him, the soul restored, forgiven,
Sing out through all the days
Her joy and God’s high praise.”
Page 5